Friends Like These
by Sarah-K1
Summary: A Marauders One-Shot. In in which Lupin has a bad day, and to make it worse: James and Sirius find out about it.


"I know, I know, you're a happily married man and your new mission in life is to similarly escort your friends down the path to bliss, but Lily was a once-in-a-lifetime find, James. If you remember, you told me that much so many times that I came near to knocking your head off, best mate or no."

James grinned sheepishly. "That knowledge has yet to fade."

"There you go." Sirius casually toasted his friend and downed the remainder of his first round of firewhisky. "I rest my case. With genuinely good women so rare, the chances of my finding such a person are about a million to one. Always barring Lily's _sister_, of course."

The laughed at the old joke, the many infamous stories of Petunia Evans hovering in their heads.

"Actually," James said, "you're out of luck there for good and all."

"Oh?" Sirius asked, trying to effect a tragic expression. "Has she slipped through my fingers at last?"

"She's engaged."

Sirius paused in his wave for the barkeep and stared. "To who?"

"His name's Vernon Dursley. It rather suits him. Ham-faced numb-nut if ever one walked the earth — I could swear he's half troll. Lil's parents insisted we all have dinner together last week to meet him; as if Petunia could have cared less, considering she hates our innards. At any rate he spent the whole meal droning on and on about some kind of useless muggle device that he sells — drebbs, or drells, or something. And Petunia's hanging on his every word, as if he were Merlin reincarnate!"

"Not Merlin, surely," Sirius snorted.

"Well, no, but the non-magical equivalent (which, I can tell you, he isn't that either). Petunia can marry whoever she damn well pleases for all I care, and he's well off and all that; I just hope they don't decide to reproduce. Imagine what kind of beastly little offspring they might have — it gives you the chills. Fortunately I'm assured that when _we _have kids, they won't be offering to baby-sit. With Petunia as mum, Dursley as lord of the manor, and a midget sized cross-breed of them both, that house they want to buy in Surrey is as good as hell on Earth so far as I'm concerned."

"When _you _have kids?" Sirius seemed befuddled by that thought, then his face turned suspicious. "Is that imminent?"

James took that opportunity to drink the remainder of his own firewhisky and look around the pub behind him. "Weren't Moony and Wormtail supposed to be here by now?"

The other wizard leaned back in his chair and his eyes narrowed suspiciously at his friend, but he let his unanswered question pass. "Moony's overdue, but he had to finish up work first. Peter's not coming — he didn't say why, just that he had a pressing engagement." Sirius grinned affectionately. "He was twitching a bit when he told me — all shifty-like. He has the symptoms of finally having a girl. Though, much as he's our friend, I can't say that _I'd_ go for him if _I_ was a girl."

"Yeah, well…" James pushed at his glasses at grinned back. "What I can't believe is that Moony's still single. Calm, virtuous, dependable; women are supposed to love that stuff."

"Sure, James, Remus is just the sort of guy to walk up to a girl and say, 'Care to spend the rest of your life with a werewolf?'"

"Bless him."

"Blast him, more like."

"Hell, now _you're _match-making?"

Sirius dodged the incoming elbow. "If I could find a good enough girl for him, I just might try it, but we're back to the subject of Lily being a rare exception in the world of women."

"Good enough for who?"

Both young men jumped a bit, their hands moving halfway to their wands before they realized it was Lupin. James turned with a grin, and clapped the third Marauder on the back. His smile faded a little when Lupin winced. Throughout their years at Hogwarts Sirius, James and Peter had become reasonably accustomed to the fact that their friend would almost always be nursing a few residual injuries from the most recent full moon. It had been those injuries, and Lupin's attempts to hide them, that had helped lead them the truth about his monthly disappearances in the first place.

A second look showed a great number of recent bandages, all of them Moony's handiwork by the looks of things. His face was pale and there was blood seeping through onto his cheek.

"You look like you played Beater without a bat," Sirius welcomed him.

Lupin smiled faintly and slid into a chair across from them. "I've looked better, I suppose. Not much, but better."

"You're right," James murmured to Sirius. "No way are we getting someone that self-deprecating married off. It's impossible."

"Oh no, you're not on that subject again."

"Mr. Married Man Potter here seems to think that the charm of bachelorhood doesn't hold a candle to the charm of a pretty red-head."

"Ah." Lupin ordered a butterbeer and leaned over to put his satchel under the table. When he came back up, he winced again, and this time Sirius frowned.

"You know, I wasn't actually kidding — you don't look well."

The other man's eyebrows rose a little. "This is unusual?"

"Oh, fine."

"Hey, what was all that crap I read in the Prophet about werewolves having to 'declare lycanthropy' during prospective job interviews?" James asked, leaning back in his chair so that the front legs tipped up off the floor.

"What was this?" Sirius scowled.

"Department for the Control of Dangerous Creatures, Statute B, Section 4, paragraph VIII." Lupin nodded. "Yes, it's new this month. Going to make it a touch difficult for me to get work — I think it definitely rules out applying for a job as Minister for Magic." He'd meant it for a joke, but James wasn't smiling.

"What do you mean? You already have a job."

"Oh, right."

"No, not 'right' — not if you really expect that kind of answer to throw us off the track here. Come on, Moony. We'll find out anyway."

Lupin sighed a little and accepted his butterbeer without much enthusiasm. He seemed to have lost his appetite, along with the remainder of the color in his face. "It… well, it always ends sooner or later. You know, eventually they realize that all my emergency holidays are used up during the full moon, or else they look me up at the Ministry, and I have yet to keep a position once they knew what I was. I didn't expect much, especially from a second-hand book shop."

"So what happened this time?" Sirius wanted to know.

James looked up with surprise at Sirius' tone. What was wrong? Besides the obvious — that Lupin had come off of a full-moon week more wounded than he'd gotten in ages, and then had been fired for it. Then belatedly he realized...

"He put two and two together," Lupin was saying, "and… that's all."

"No, I mean when did you get all ripped up."

"Sirius—"

"Don't even, you idiot. You think we could go all those years at Hogwarts and not keep permanent tabs on the cycles of the moon? The full moon's not due for two weeks." Sirius leaned across the table, stabbing the top of it with his finger. "_You're _going to tell me your former boss didn't cut you up, and _I'm _not going to believe a word of it. We're about to have a rousing argument where you _defend _the bastard and try to convince me I shouldn't go find him and return the favor. Since it's inevitable, would you like to order your second round before we start?"

There was a heavy pause.

"James… Sirius…" Lupin looked twice his actual age, and at the same time: helpless. "Please, just hear me out. His daughter had been bitten."

"So he lashes out at _you _for being a werewolf when his own daughter is one already?" James spluttered.

"No, please, let me finish." A fine sweat was breaking out on his forehead. "A werewolf denied human prey will turn on itself — you know that. There is no urge for the werewolf to _kill _itself, but there is an urge to maim, to draw blood, to make something hurt — even if it is yourself you are hurting. With children… The first transformation is already so traumatic, it sometimes happens that the added injuries… they don't intend to go so far, but you lose your mind and you're not in control anymore… you're the animal, and it… it's just too much. His daughter didn't survive her first full moon." His eyes cut away from theirs. "I don't blame him for being upset."

"Remus," James said gently, the old bantering and teasing gone without a trace, "did _you_ bite his daughter?"

Lupin's head came up sharply. "No! I've never bitten anyone — ever! You know that, James."

"Exactly," Sirius nodded. "Whatever happened to the man's daughter — it was not your fault. He can't be allowed to get away with attacking you for something some other werewolf did. As you, Prefect Lupin, should know: _it's against the bloody law_. You've got to stop taking all this lying down; there's a limit to trying not to follow in the footsteps of the general werewolf population! You're getting downright masochistic."

"What was I to say?" Lupin demanded, too tired to sound truly impatient. "All I could think of was that first night, and my parents trying so hard to pretend that I'd be okay in the morning as they locked me in the cellar so I wouldn't bite the neighbors."

"That's what you should have told him!" James nodded. "He needs to know he hasn't got a monopoly on my-child-got-bit-by-a-werewolf market."

"It's complicated," Remus sighed.

"It's not, it's simple — you _make _it complicated with your attitude of being too dangerous to have a normal life. Moony, any other man would have given it up by now. Our world just makes it too damned difficult for a werewolf to make an honest living. But you stick it out; you always have. Better than I bet I could in your place. Believe it or not, you do deserve a little credit here. Did you give back as good as you got?"

Lupin's eyes dropped to his bandaged forearms.

"Thought not," James muttered.

Sirius was looking black death at any of the bar patrons who had the misfortune to catch his eye.

"So," the last heir of the Potters sounded ominously conversational, "I imagine the singed eyebrows are from a few conjured flames—"

"James—"

"—and the bruises are probably an impediment jinx or two. Those red lines around your neck bring to mind a strangling hex—"

"James, please—"

"—but I can't figure out where all the slices on your arms and face came from."

Moony sighed in defeat. "He conjured a few knives and charmed them to chase me from the building. It took a little while to fend them off. Look, all I need is a few drops of Stitching Solution and I'll be fine. I'd have gone home and done it instead of coming here, only I was afraid you'd get worried."

The sheer ridiculousness of the statement sent Sirius into a shock of barking laughter. He leaned back in his chair, and practically howled, before his expression abruptly wiped itself into a cold mask and he stood up from the table. "If you'll excuse me, I have a fat little book seller to kill."

"Sirius, don't you dare," Lupin said warningly, standing and holding out a restraining hand.

"No, he's right. Together, Padfoot, old friend?"

"Definitely."

"_Damn _you both, will you stop and listen to me!"

They stopped. There were long periods of time when they forgot that Remus knew how to shout, and his occasional reminders always managed to stun them.

"I won't allow it! I know you're upset on my behalf, and I'm grateful…" he paused, looking away for a moment. "I can't even tell you how grateful." Then he met their eyes. "But if I can force myself to do what is right, I can bloody well force you too. I don't want— no… no I _won't_ be the cause of you losing control. I know you well enough to know you won't go kill that man, but I don't want you anywhere near that mark in the first place — not again."

Sirius stared. "Come on, Remus, that was — what? — five years ago? And you're not going to tell us Snivellus didn't deserve it."

"Yeah," broke in James, "he called you a—"

"I remember," Lupin snapped. "I remember him getting taken to Madame Pomfrey with a broken leg too. You didn't _mean _to break it. You were angry and you went too far. And I was the cause." He stepped away from them, his voice falling almost to a whisper. "Never again. Promise?"

There was a long silence. A few of the other patrons had been watching, but since the argument seemed to be settling down, they now went back to their drinks. James looked at Sirius and Padfoot looked at Prongs, and together they slowly nodded.

"Alright, Remus. You win," James said softly.

"Yeah, okay — Fatty the Bookseller lives to fight another day. But he'd better hope he never crosses my path again—" he raised his hands placatingly, "joking, just joking!"

"Good. Well… this has certainly been a red-letter day." Remus sat down with a wince.

"Ah, no you don't. C'mon, wolfman — in the absence of a wife of your own, I'm just going to have to take you to mine to get you cleaned up." James grabbed his elbow, nodding for Sirius to take the other. "She's marvelous when it comes to cuts and bruises."

"What will Lily say to your bringing home a half-dead werewolf to bleed on her rug?" Sirius mused, pushing open the door and sniffing the cool night air brightly. "I mean, we know she's perfect, but every witch has her limits."

"Oh, no, she'll be fine with seeing Remus — it's when she sees _you _that she might decide to lay down newspapers, old dog."

Lupin chuckled, and Sirius (after a quick check for observers) transformed into a large black dog which first licked James' ear in sloppy delight, and then gamboled about them as they strolled away under the streetlamps.


End file.
